22 year old in college with a million dollar business. Ask me anything!

[Jmadd95OE]

Very nice and welcome to the forum.. and very impressive!!

My question is: Why are you still in college? lol... I have a business degree and even though I had the time of my life during those "freedom and responsibility free" years, I would have dropped out in a heartbeat if I could go back in time.

I know I wanted to do the same. Parents wanted me to stay. Anyways it builds character having to do both school and work!

 

[MoneyDoc]

Welcome to the forums buddy. I'm also 22 with my own private label brands on amazon and off amazon. Not at $1 million in sales yet, but I'm not very far away.

Quick question - since you have retail experience, how would you recommend I approach this. Was contacted by 7-11 last year after I submitted a vendor application for them to carry my energy drink brand. Was contacted by the actual buyer responsible for beverages. He told us to send him samples, we did. We followed up with him after a couple of weeks of delivery of the samples. He said he liked the samples, they tasted good, looked good, etc. He then went on to asking about our pricing per can. We sent him all that information. He told us they will discuss it among themselves to figure out where to place our products, how to move on, etc. However, it's been a few months we haven't heard from him. Been sending him follow up emails constantly, no replies. No clue why he would suddenly go "cold" on us.

Thanks.

 

[Argue]

Thanks for the responses. Here was my response by the way. Still learning how the forum works so I think I'm posting my response twice but whatever

Hey! Basically what you need to understand is Amazon FBA and business itself is a "dog eat dog" world. Going and telling everyone what your product is on an open forum opens yourself up to competition and counterfeit sellers (I have experienced this before).

The Product is only 10% of your business. The other 90% of business is marketing, execution, and creative ideas. Focusing on the product will not get you anywhere. Most fantastic products don't go anywhere.

That said thank you for your interest in my product.

If you want to know my product. I will send you an NDA you can sign it and you can ask anything you want.

DM me!

I like this kid. I have no questions but welcome to the forum! Keep up the great work!

 

[Scot]

Bro.. I’m 19. I’m trying to learn from you so bad. Lol. I want to connect with you bc I’m trying to be a solopreneur through college with digital marketing. Hopefully I can grow it enough to where it will leave me debt free. Seriously man I’d love to connect with you. You are where I want to get at this point in life and I want to give you what I know this far. Reply back brother!

Try again with less “bros” and “lol”.

Would you reply to this message if you got it?

 

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[Sanj Modha]

Boom!

Congratulations - I'm getting into FBA so what's the best way to ranked quickly? I uploaded a new product but it doesn't have a BSR yet and I've ran PPC ads to it too. I've also heard of people running external traffic like FB to a lander first.

Like you I run a lot of FB traffic to my Shopify stores.

What are your thought on this? Thanks.

 

[KSR]

The business started two years ago.

No it was getting 0 Sales a day, and through listening to scott voelkers podcasts on FBA and doing a lot of research I was able to start getting sales with the product! My Dad and I started it together.

Thanks for the podcast! I'm giving Ep. 1 a listen now

 

[Guest304]

Why I'm the world would I want to steal his product? I'm in the lighting industry. If it's a good product I assume it's patented. If it's not, then that answer would suffice. Hey I don't wanna tell you because it's not patented it. Everyone's awfully uppety about a question.

Maybe it's past experience with members on the forum and it's warranted I don't know? I'm genuinely curious in what the guy is selling. If he can't answer he can't answer.

But... I suppose it's more fun for everyone to pile on.

 

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[Jmadd95OE]

No questions but welcome to the forum. Very impressive for a 22 year old (impressive at any age!) - I hope you stick around.

Thank you Fox!

I'm beginning to think this forum is a form of karma. Every time we get a great new user, a turd shows up. Every time a turd shows up, we get a great new user.

Welcome to the forum, phenomenal success thus far, just make sure you keep going forward.

You have a lot to teach, thank you for doing this AMA.

I know this forum will give back in spades.

Thanks Scot!

 

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[Jmadd95OE]

So what was your initial launch like, if you didn't use either of those services?

We have a 10k + email list that we give an offer too. If you don't have an email list you pretty much have to do a giveaway using one of those websites.

 

[Jmadd95OE]

What are some the best books you can recommend on the subject, other than of course MFL.

I don't really read many books. I only listen to podcasts while I am walking around in school.

Podcasts I recommend:
ecommercefuel
scott voelker
this week in start ups
ETl- Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders

 

[_Kaiser_]

Hey welcome to the forum! What made you stick to your degree while running a business at the same time? Very impressive at what you achieved at a young age.

 

[hatzil]

Welcome to the forum and good luck mate
1. Do you feel learning in college sometimes got you out of focus working on your e-commerce? I want to open an e-commerce business but at the same time study additive manufacturing or work in real-estate.
2.Do you think that focusing on one product is what allowed you to market it so well?
3.About the creation of the product: do your dad is an inventor or he had an idea and execute it?

- I do not own an e-commerce yet, but I do have few good books to give you about growth hacking & more. I am available on skype: hatzil47

 

[Guest304]

It's literally none of your business and not relevant to the thread. You are missing the forest because of all of the trees.

He doesn't owe you an answer to satisfy your curiosity. It doesn't matter what the product is.

Focus on process.

I know he doesn't. No need to be rude about it. I don't need to know the process. I get the process. I'm interested in what he's selling. Maybe I want one? It's relatively inexpensive and he sells a lot. Maybe it's unique and cool. Not EVERYthing is about the money.

I know I know. Crazy idea. I'm genuinely interested. It doesn't make sense to me that he's selling it online, but can't talk about it. While it's not my business (literally). He posted it on a public forum. Don't see how it hurts to inquire.

 

[KSR]

I'm thinking this thread should be #notable -- despite all that crap up the top.

Do you think the FBA program is doable if you're not American and/or living in the US?
I've wanted to try my hand at it but I'm Australian and have some hesitations due to that fact.

 

[Jmadd95OE]

have you done any paid ads on Instagram? Or did you just stick to facebook?

Yes I have done paid Instagram. Found some success... not as much as Facebook!

Welcome to the forums buddy. I'm also 22 with my own private label brands on amazon and off amazon. Not at $1 million in sales yet, but I'm not very far away.

Quick question - since you have retail experience, how would you recommend I approach this. Was contacted by 7-11 last year after I submitted a vendor application for them to carry my energy drink brand. Was contacted by the actual buyer responsible for beverages. He told us to send him samples, we did. We followed up with him after a couple of weeks of delivery of the samples. He said he liked the samples, they tasted good, looked good, etc. He then went on to asking about our pricing per can. We sent him all that information. He told us they will discuss it among themselves to figure out where to place our products, how to move on, etc. However, it's been a few months we haven't heard from him. Been sending him follow up emails constantly, no replies. No clue why he would suddenly go "cold" on us.

Thanks.

Awesome Job Man! 7/11 is a big player.

Do you have his phone number or his address to send a package?

Is this your first retail store that has approached you? What is your experience in this? Sending Pricing is usually where they fall off, so you always need to say that you are willing to negotiate.

 

[Greg R]

Why I'm the world would I want to steal his product? I'm in the lighting industry. If it's a good product I assume it's patented. If it's not, then that answer would suffice. Hey I don't wanna tell you because it's not patented it. Everyone's awfully uppety about a question.

Maybe it's past experience with members on the forum and it's warranted I don't know? I'm genuinely curious in what the guy is selling. If he can't answer he can't answer.

But... I suppose it's more fun for everyone to pile on.

You are completely missing the point. His product doesn't even matter. It's his process. Knowing what the product is will do nothing for you. Knowing his process will.

 

[Jmadd95OE]

I'm looking at Viral Launch and Zonblast.

Do you have a preference?

I haven't used either of them. I can tell you from my other friends in the space, they have had success with viral launch.

 

[Jmadd95OE]

Didn't see page 2.

Anyway, Thanks for doing this - super cool to hear about you and dad working together. I used to dig holes for my father haha. Wasn't as fun as you're having but I learned a lot. Don't care what your product is but I'm interested in your process for finding a supplier. I know that you mentioned you deal with a US manufacturer. That's smart! Did you use any sites to help in finding them?

Thanks kid

We did a lot of google searches, and then talked to about 30 manufacturers until we figured out exactly what we were looking for. The hardest part is finding what exactly you are looking for a manufacturer. For example most people need an OTC manufacturer and they don't even know it!

 

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[Jmadd95OE]

Hi man,

Thanks for the info so far!

My question is how much did you spend on marketing online before you found the "right way" to do it.

By the right way I mean when you were comfortable with the result and were to improve from that point forward.

About 50K. Still have a lot to work on with it, but we got results we were ok with.

 

[jarvisdiego]

Thanks for sharing all this information! It is great

How would you recommend starting?
I am a newbie and I would greatly appreciate any help...

 

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[Tim Allen Jr.]

The "delete my account" says otherwise.



I seem to have missed the thread disclosing your multi-million dollar+ business, complete with the product you sell.



Sorry, but we're protective of real entrepreneurs who are doing stuff.

Too many cooks stealing from the chefs. And those cooks only care about "what do you sell?!?!" so they can quickly copy.

If that explanation upsets you, I'll be happy to delete your account.

FAACCKKKKK - Damn I love this forum and the understanding of what you and other have mentioned is why I love this forum.

Products come and go, but process, process, process is what can/will make shit happen..... Thanks to OP for insights, thanks to MJ (and others) for talking real shit, and thanks to the group for asking solid questions.

And again..... FACCKKKKK.... I love this forum .

 

[MJ DeMarco]

Bump. This was accidentally moved to the INSIDE, now back OUTSIDE.

 

[johnp]

This is turning into a great thread so far. Thanks for doing this.

You're saying a lot of stuff that's kind of aligned with what I have been figuring out/noticing and myself, even right down to using Hotjar - which is an amazing tool. Anyway, I'm just getting started with my product and making some sales via Amazon & FB. Right now I manufacture all of my products at my house, I sell a certain type of body and dental spray. I have two questions. Don't feel compelled to answer if you think that I'm asking too much.

1. For Amazon ads - Not sure if I missed an answer to this, I'm just getting started here. Did you use any resources to learn Amazon ads? If so, then do you mind sharing? I'm just getting started with the Amz ads and learning by putting my own money into it. It seems pretty straight forward, but I feel like there has to be more to it. Somehow I'm profitable right out of the gate. I just can't imagine that it's really this easy.

2. Facebook Question

I have a funnel. I have a interesting video that goes to a landing page that grabs an email address. I have an email marketing sequence that I send them, and eventually I am able to get a sale.

I have tried a lot of different things on FB, except for video still. I basically discovered that it's really hard to get cold FB traffic to pull out their card. I'm not saying that it's not possible, I have seen people make millions driving traffic to offers, which hasn't worked for me yet. Anyway, here's what I have been doing lately.

- I go over to Buzzfeed and find an article that's popular in my niche, then rewrite it but better and in my own words.
- Then I add that article to a landing page (I call it a Dark Landing Page - only for cold traffic), but I make the landing page look like a native blog post, where I throw up ads to my product all over the place.
- Then I drive broad, cold traffic to the blog post.
- From there I build custom audiences and start to bucket and segment traffic traffic to offers that way.

I've been getting clicks for about $0.03 and really low CPAS overall with this strategy. But I'm wondering if I have over complicated things a bit too much, especially because I'm not grabbing the email of cold traffic. Based on what you have figured out so far, do you think that I'd be better off just driving cold traffic to a LM or some offer for their email address?

Also, great to see you using email marketing. My day job is at an email company that sends billions of emails per month. Email is powerful when used the right way, I see it first hand every single day. If you ever have an email deliverability question then feel free to PM me.

 

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[Gwenqou]

Inspiring Post!

How do you go about finding US manufacturers?

I'm interested in the process of finding US manufacturers. I've been sick of importing products and dealing with suppliers from oversea and have been thinking about moving the production to US. I've been using ThomasNet but could only find two manufacturers for my niche, and they don't seem to make similar product as the one that I want to manufacture. You mentioned that you talked to 30 manufacturers, how did you go about to discover and select manufacturers?

 

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[Guest58302]

What, was he not really a millionaire? Did he not send the mods proof?

He left 3 months after MJ asked for proof, so I don’t know.

I just posted that since he probably won’t be answering any questions or inquiries.

 

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[TheRedShaman]

I'm just reading all the NOTABLE and GOLD threads and this one seemed odd. Has anyone looked at this thread in a while? Should this be a notable if the guy was a fake?

 

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[KSR]

Welcome to the forum. You should read 'The Millionaire Fastlane ' - it goes into specifics about how to separate time from money and other great life aspects.

Great to have you here -- can never have enough knowledge floating about.

How long has your business been running?
Was the business already quite successful before you started running the Marketing or did you and your Dad start this with you?

Once again, welcome.

 

[G-Man]

What process did you find to be most effective for getting into retail stores?

Cold contacts? Leveraging existing relationships? Distributor/showrooms? Tradeshows?

x2

 

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[AnAverageJoe]

Welcome to the forum! I'm getting started in FBA right now. What do you know now that you wish you knee starting out? Are you getting your product manufactured overseas?

Sent from my Nexus 6 using Tapatalk

 

[Jmadd95OE]

Best way to get ranked is a giveaway. Make sure you don't ask for reviews. There are Facebook Groups and a bunch of services (viral launch, zonblast, etc.) that do this. I personally don't use giveaways anymore because my brand is established, but its the fastest way to get it ranked if you don't want to do the whole organic and ppc thing.

Facebook Ads is a crabshoot. I wasted about 30k before I figured out what works. I would not recommend sending a Facebook ad directly to amazon. The conversion rate will be too low and will negatively affect your ranking. The best way to use Facebook for amazon, is to collect emails, run an email campaign, and then send them to the listing. You have to turn them from a cold lead into a hot lead essentially.

Sending Facebook to Shopify is the best way since you can see how they interact with your website using (Google Analytics, HotJar, etc.). It is also very tough to succeed using Facebook Ads to shopify too. You have to do a lot of A/B Testing and figure out your targeting group. I have seen a lot of people spend thousands of dollars on Facebook without any sales.

My Facebook Ads Method is:

5 Dollars a Day for 5 Days= 25 Dollars spent on one Ad
Low CTR (Under 1%)= Change Ad Copy or Picture (Pictures are a very important part of Facebook Ads)
No Conversions=( Change Landing Page)- Look at HotJar/Crazyegg or Heatmap to see where people are leaving

I recommend doing Facebook ads as well. CPC is much cheaper and high interaction!

For Targeting using Audience Insights. I can go more into this if you like

Hope that Helps!

I meant Facebook Video Ads!